arttraction

m.snowe is not at all confused as to why artists of all forms have certain accoutrements about them. Writers have a pen, musicians have drum sticks, guitars, etc., painters have brushes, performers have microphones, and so on and so forth. All of these “extensions” of self that represent the “instruments” of one’s art, the fountainheads of one’s inspiration…well, m.snowe thinks you’re clever enough to see where she’s going with this. And of course, that’s somewhere pointy, and phallic. Of course, this theoretical argument only works for the male artists, and begs a very different question about what women get out of the deal–but let’s ignore that very valid argument for just a few sentences.

The question m.snowe would like to have answered is this one: if we know it’s all for show… if we know that the extensions of self through art are indeed separate and unconnected (i.e. a musician isn’t encapsulated in one song or their performance of it, a painter is not one painting…m.snowe hopes, anyways), then why are so many otherwise level-headed people given to swoons around artists of all shapes and sizes? How do they translate beautiful music, or breathtaking art, into a false-sense of intimacy with the creator, who unlike the art, could be cruel, ugly, or just plain stupid?

m.snowe herself is guilty of such blind admiration (she hates to say, in certain circumstances), but also hopes the reader will carefully weigh the evidence–exhibits being that artists are indeed a troublesome lot. One should not cast their wills with them so casually. And one should always understand that although art in all forms, when experienced, can speak many more words than any of us in our lifetimes, an artist is the vessel–and can be anything–kind, wicked, crooked, deceitful.  m.snowe asks for others (and herself) that in viewing the art, one is not blinded to the life around it.

“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,” – that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

Keats may have been onto something here–stick to the art, separate from the creator. [Think what wonders that would do if we applied that to religion!]